


Take Me Home

by SegaBarrett



Category: Breaking Bad
Genre: Gen, Post-Felina
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-25
Updated: 2013-12-25
Packaged: 2018-01-06 00:15:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,180
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1100210
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SegaBarrett/pseuds/SegaBarrett
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Brock makes a break for it, only to end up somewhere he didn't expect.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Take Me Home

**Author's Note:**

  * For [APgeeksout](https://archiveofourown.org/users/APgeeksout/gifts).



> Disclaimer: I don't own Breaking Bad and I make no money from this.
> 
> Warnings: Ethnic slurs against Hispanics, child-on-child bullying (including a death threat), child neglect, worst foster parents ever. References to canon character death. 
> 
> A/N: Parts of this were inspired by Memoirs of a Geisha (Arthur Golden) and The Best Nest (P.D. Eastman)... As weird as that sounds.

Brock Cantillo shivered, teeth chattering as he pulled his thin blanket around him. It could get cold in New Mexico at night, but as far as he could tell, the heat wasn’t on.

It was hard to sleep, anyway; it had been, ever since the day he had woken up and gone downstairs to sirens and yellow caution tape.

He’d been so confused. There had been policemen everywhere.

“Where’s… where’s my mom?” Brock had asked one of them, and he’d looked at him with a solemn expression.

A woman had come over, then. She’d called herself Miss Patty, and she’d led him away in her car. Then he had gone to this house with the cold bedroom. The people weren’t nice, either. They ignored him and their son called him a “spic”. He didn’t know what that meant, but he guessed it had something to do with his brown skin.

He had used to like his skin, but their blonde son, older than Brock, twelve or thirteen, made him feel like it made him dirty or ugly.

He would sit at lunch and knock Brock’s plate off the table on purpose, sniping, “Whoops! Brock doesn’t want lunch. Spic wants burritos instead, I guess.”

The parents would glare at Brock instead of at their son, and Brock wanted to sink into a hole, to disappear, to go back in time.

That night, before Brock had gone to bed, the son had told him, “Better not go to sleep, spic, or I’ll kill you while you’re sleeping. Dirty Mexican. You better run away back to Mexico or I’ll get you.”

Brock remembered those words as he sat up in bed and shivered again.

He didn’t know about Mexico, or how he’d get there, but he definitely thought he had better run away. That seemed like the only thing to do.

He dropped his blanket and walked to the window. He reached out and grabbed both of the tabs on the window and pulled it up. Next, he pressed his hand against the screen until it popped out, falling with a soft thud.

He slipped a foot out until it pressed against the roof. Brock clutched the window as he slowly moved his feet against the shingles, shuffling along carefully, terrified, breath in his throat.

It was even colder outside than it had been in the house, but he had to go, or he’d be dead.

He wrapped his arms around himself at the word. He didn’t want to die.

He hopped down off the roof, tumbling to the ground. His feet hurt when he landed, but he started running as fast as he could.

He didn’t know where he was going. He just needed to get far away from there, that place he couldn’t bear to call home.

It was cold outside, bitterly cold, and he wished that he had thought to grab a jacket, or at least a sweater. He didn’t have time to think about it; he would just have to get somewhere warmer eventually.

He kept walking, feeling his fingers get more and more numb until he was sure he couldn’t feel them at all. He felt like he was going to collapse against the frozen ground before very long.

He looked at the street in front of him out of desperation, hoping he’d see a safe place, maybe a gas station or a library where he could stay, and was surprised to realize he recognized the house he was staring at.

Jesse’s house. Maybe Jesse was home; maybe he would let him in.

When he got to the door, it was locked, and no lights were on. As he was heading back out towards the gate, though, he noticed an open window to the basement.

Brock doubled back and grabbed the window, pushing it a little more, slowly slipping one leg and then the other into the open space. It was a tight fit and he had to suck his breath in, but he pushed himself through and landed with a crash on the basement floor.

Brock slowly rose to his feet, brushing himself off as he made his way to the concrete stairs, up through the door and into the living room. It was chilly in the house, but warmer than it had been outside. It was nice to be back in Jesse’s house. It felt safe here.

Up the stairs and into the master bedroom; Brock ducked under the blankets and wrapped himself in them with a little whimper. What was he going to do now? He needed somebody to help, somehow.

He must have fallen asleep because he was jolted awake by the sound of someone entering the room and then the sound of a voice.

“Is someone in here? Come out. I know you’re here.”

Jesse’s voice. Sounding furious but with a bit of fear in there, too.

Brock slowly poked his head out from under the blanket and made a little sound. 

“Jesse?” he whispered, turning his head in the direction of the doorway. There was a silhouette there, and when he spoke the silhouette put something on the ground.

“Brock!” Jesse burst towards him, gasping. “Oh my God, kid! How did you get in here? What happened? Are you okay?” He put a hand up to Brock’s cheek and touched it gently. “You’re freezing! Shit, lemme turn on the heat. Stay here.”

Jesse vanished, pausing to pick up whatever he’d left on the ground and bring it with him, before Brock heard the tell-tale sign of the heating being turned on, the same rattle and breathe-out that he used to hear back in both of his old houses.

Then Jesse was back in the room.

“Hey, kid,” he said gently. “What’s going on?”

Brock clung to the blanket and looked at him through the darkness. 

“I ran away,” he told him, and he tried to tell him everything else, about the mean kid and the policemen and Miss Patty and the sirens and how lonely everything felt recently and how he wished he could just go back to how it had been but all he got out was, “I miss Mommy.”

In a flash, Jesse was there, with his arms wrapped around him, and Brock could hear Jesse crying too. He didn’t understand – Jesse was a grown-up, a man, and they didn’t cry, did they? 

He didn’t have time to question it, though; he just buried his head in Jesse’s chest and sobbed.

“I miss her too,” Jesse said after a long moment. “It’s okay kid. We’ll work it all out. I don’t know how yet, but I promise we will okay?”

Brock nodded. He felt so tired. 

“For right now,” Jesse whispered, “Why don’t I see what I have for food? You need to eat.”

Brock slowly nodded again, but as Jesse let him back down, he closed his eyes and fell asleep again, dreaming of Sonic Adventures and magic tricks and a place where everything was safe. He slept better than he had any day in the past six months.


End file.
